


every battle heads toward surrender on both sides

by wordslinging



Category: The Old Guard (Movie 2020)
Genre: Blood and Violence, Crusades, Enemies to Lovers, First Time, M/M, Pre-Canon, Rough Sex, Temporary Character Death
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-07-20
Updated: 2020-07-20
Packaged: 2021-03-05 00:56:07
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,680
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/25395757
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/wordslinging/pseuds/wordslinging
Summary: “I killed him. The one who cut you down.”  He needs, with a fervor he couldn’t possibly explain if asked, for Nicolo to know that.Nicolo looks up, eyes wide. “He was your comrade,” he says softly, with confusion but no judgment.Yusuf shrugs. “He killed you.”Nicolo arches a brow. “You’ve killed me four times. And I’ve killed you five.”“That’s different,” Yusuf says, and prays Nicolo won’t press for an explanation ofhowit’s different.Or: During the Third Crusade, Yusuf watches Nicolo die at the hands of someone who isn't him, and doesn't take it well.
Relationships: Joe | Yusuf Al-Kaysani/Nicky | Nicolò di Genova
Comments: 58
Kudos: 1522





	every battle heads toward surrender on both sides

**Author's Note:**

> HEY SO I said something on Twitter about how "there’s gotta have been at LEAST one time where one of them got killed by someone else and the other went apeshit because only they get to kill each other, how dare" and then I had to write it. 
> 
> Note that historical research for this has been cursory, I just jumped on this ship with the movie and have not yet read the graphic novel. Joe and Nicky are very much at what I like to think of as the "enemies with benefits" stage of their relationship here, so if tenderness mixed with violence (up to and including temporary murder) isn't your jam, maybe give this one a miss.
> 
> (...If it IS your jam, come sit next to me so we can talk about these two making out on the battlefield after just having woken up from killing each other.)

It’s easy to die and come back as someone new, fighting in the Crusades. Easy to take an arrow to the throat and tumble off one’s horse into a convenient ravine, or take a sword to the stomach and lie quietly on the battlefield until after the fighting dies down, but before anyone comes to collect the dead and wounded. Easy to join the fight again with a new name and a beard newly grown or shaved, and trust no one will connect the latest version of you to the one who fell weeks or months before.

Yusuf has been the current version of himself for half a year, fighting under Salah ad-Din’s banner, when he and the Italian find each other again.

It’s a well-practiced dance by now; the odd sense of quiet that descends as Yusuf catches sight of a familiar form, clad in the black and white of the Hospitaller knights. The way the rest of the world stops existing, for just a moment, when sea-green eyes meet his own over the field. The excitement that builds in him as Nicolo’s face shifts from stoic calm to a faint smirk of challenge. 

Yusuf spurs his horse forward and Nicolo rides to meet him, but then his focus is pulled to the side, his shield coming up to ward off the blow of a scimitar. 

A scimitar held in a hand that is not Yusuf’s. A soldier who is not Yusuf, seizing the opportunity to attack Nicolo while Yusuf held his attention. 

Yusuf shouts and races toward them. Other soldiers come between them and he cuts them down without even seeing whether they are Christian or Muslim. He tries to remember the name of the man who’s engaged Nicolo, screams for him to _leave that one, that one is mine_ , and then just screams without words as blood sprays from Nicolo’s mouth and he goes down. 

Yusuf’s blade finds the neck of his killer moments later. The man doesn’t even have time to look confused. 

Yusuf dismounts hurriedly and gathers Nicolo up. He’s not stirring yet, the gash across his torso wide and deep, and Yusuf slings the knight’s limp body over his saddle and doesn’t let himself think of what he’ll do if those eyes don’t open again. He hears shouts in Arabic and knows he’s been seen, knows that even if he makes it through today without dying he’ll have to disappear for a while, but that doesn’t matter now. 

All that matters is Nicolo.

***

Yusuf rides away from the battle until he’s sure they’re not being pursued. At some point he hears a small groan, feels a twitch from the body slung in front of him, and the breath rushes out of him in relief. He doesn’t speak, but lays one hand on Nicolo’s back, keeps it there until he pulls the horse to a stop, dusk falling around them.

The knight’s eyes are still closed as Yusuf bears him gently to the ground, one hand cradling the back of his head. Yusuf checks the wound—closed, but not entirely gone—and then shakes his shoulder gently. 

“Get up,” he says softly in Greek, the one language they both speak enough of for conversation. Nicolo doesn’t move. “Get _up_ , you bastard, I can see you breathing.”

Nicolo moves with a predator’s speed, hand going to his hip, and Yusuf has just enough time to see steel flash before a dagger sinks hilt-deep into his eye.

***

“I apologize,” is the first thing Nicolo says to him when he wakes. “That was rude of me.”

Yusuf sits up, rubbing his eye. “I’ve had more polite greetings, yes.”

“It wasn’t you who killed me back there,” Nicolo goes on, gathering brush into a small pile. “Now our count is off.”

“We’ll even it up sooner or later,” Yusuf says. He stands to dig through his saddle bags and tosses Nicolo a flint, which he strikes with his dagger after cleaning the last of Yusuf’s blood from it.

Yusuf sits across from Nicolo and watches him feed more kindling to the fire. “I killed him. The one who cut you down.” 

He needs, with a fervor he couldn’t possibly explain if asked, for Nicolo to know that.

Nicolo looks up, eyes wide. “He was your comrade,” he says softly, with confusion but no judgment.

Yusuf shrugs. “He killed you.”

Nicolo arches a brow. “You’ve killed me four times. And I’ve killed you five.”

“That’s different,” Yusuf says, and prays Nicolo won’t press for an explanation of _how_ it’s different.

He doesn’t. He casts his gaze downward for a moment, then says, quietly, “Thank you.”

Silence reigns for a moment, punctuated by the crackle of the fire and the nighttime sounds of the desert around them. 

“Besides, it’s three and four,” Yusuf says. “That time on the cliff doesn’t count, we’ve been over this.”

“I pushed you over,” Nicolo counters, because they _have_ been over it, but that’s his line.

“You _tried_ , and I tried to pull you with me, and then the ledge crumbled under both our feet,” Yusuf reminds him, as though explaining to a child. “Doesn’t count.”

Nicolo huffs out a laugh and shows his teeth in what Yusuf decides to call a smile. Then, as if continuing an earlier conversation, he asks, “Well, then, have you got anything to eat?”

Neither of them says anything as cliche as _truce until morning_. Neither of them is currently trying to kill the other, which means they’re operating under a truce that will end the next time one of them does. Until then, they share the rations from Yusuf’s saddle bags, pass Nicolo’s water skin back and forth, and talk about where they’ve been and what they’ve seen and done since the last time they met. 

At some point Yusuf edges around the fire until they’re shoulder to shoulder. At some point Nicolo puts a hand on his thigh and leaves it there. And at some point, as the moon rises above them, Yusuf turns his head and lifts his hand to find Nicolo’s stubble-rough jaw under his fingers and Nicolo already leaning in to meet him, lips parted.

It’s not the first time they’ve kissed. The first time was over a century ago, lying on the battlefield where they’d woken side-by-side. The first time, Nicolo was holding Yusuf’s wrist while Yusuf held a knife an inch from his throat, and Yusuf couldn’t tell whose blood he was tasting in Nicolo’s mouth.

This is the first time Nicolo presses Yusuf onto the ground beneath him, the first time Yusuf pushes away the shreds of Nicolo’s tabard to get at the fastenings of his armor. Nicolo’s skin is warm and smooth, his heart beating hard as Yusuf finally gets a hand under his tunic and slides it up to his chest. 

They bare each other to the waist and then Yusuf clutches at Nicolo’s hips and pulls, unwilling to wait any longer. Nicolo settles astride him, hands on his shoulders as they find each other’s mouths again, rough and urgent. He moans and tosses his head back as their still-clothed cocks rub against each other, and Yusuf arches against him, leaning up to nip at the line of his throat.

Nicolo swears softly in Italian, one hand curling around the back of Yusuf’s head. His other works its way between their bodies, fumbling with laces and cloth, and then it’s Yusuf’s turn to swear as strong, agile fingers close around both their cocks at once.

He lowers his head, mouthing his way from Nicolo’s throat to his chest. The wound is long gone by now, but he kisses a path across the unmarred skin where it was anyway, feeling Nicolo sigh and twine his fingers in Yusuf’s curls as he does.

Yusuf pulls back to look at his face, finds Nicolo’s eyes on him wide and dark with desire. “None but me,” he says, and doesn’t specify whether he means no one else is allowed to touch Nicolo like this, or no one else is allowed to kill him.

Nicolo takes Yusuf’s face in both hands, lowering his head until their foreheads touch. “None but you,” he replies, and doesn’t ask for clarification.

Nicolo kisses him again, tongue plunging into Yusuf’s mouth like he means to devour him. Yusuf grips him tight and rolls their hips together, the movement slick and easy now with less clothing in the way. When they fall, together, over the edge of mindless bliss, it’s nearly as violent as some of their battles have been. Yusuf bites at Nicolo’s shoulder until he draws blood, nuzzles and kisses the marks as they vanish beneath his lips, then bites again. Nicolo grips Yusuf’s hair in his fingers until Yusuf’s eyes water, until he’s sure Nicolo’s torn some of it out by the roots. They rut against each other like beasts, cries ringing through the cool night air as wetness splatters between them.

They lie for a time, Yusuf folding Nicolo in his arms while Nicolo pants against his neck, before Nicolo sits up. He swipes a hand through the cooling mess on their bellies and examines his fingers for a moment, then touches them experimentally to his tongue and makes a small, contemplative _hmm_ sound. Yusuf growls and pulls him down into another kiss. 

Eventually they clean up as well as they can, and eventually they sleep, side-by-side and face-to-face with Yusuf’s hand resting on the side of Nicolo’s neck and Nicolo’s arm draped across Yusuf’s middle, Yusuf’s thin blanket covering them both.

Yusuf wakes to find that Nicolo has taken the horse but left him the blanket, as well as what’s left of the water. Nearby, a strip of cloth from the ruin of Nicolo’s tabard rests under a stone, edges fluttering in the breeze. Yusuf picks it up to find words scrawled on it in what he can only assume is Nicolo’s own blood. _Heading for Jerusalem. Find me if you want to even the count._

Yusuf grins, stretches his sore limbs, and starts walking.


End file.
